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Really unfortunate that this happened to someone as nice and competent as Eich. His leadership would have held amazing things for Mozilla, the open web, javascr

by pvnick 13y ago

Really unfortunate that this happened to someone as nice and competent as Eich. His leadership would have held amazing things for Mozilla, the open web, javascript, rust, all of it. Instead he got targetted by an intollerant lynch mob that felt it had to strong-arm someone with views they didn't agree with. Sure, you could say it's a human rights issue. But ask yourself, would you consider it reasonable for Christians to target some arbitrary CEO who donated some money to planned parenthood several years ago, since that person was violating the human rights of infant children? And then for that CEO to step down in shame for because their respect for human life was in question? Of course not, that would be silly.

zobzu 13y ago
yeah he had great views such as making firefox technically relevant (through rust, through asmjs, through multiprocessing, etc) and looking at mozilla's real value (users trust mozilla) except, that 2nd point became an issue with him ceo, too. sad.
jamesaguilar 13y ago
Um. Yes, I would be upset if your proposed scenario happened (and similar things do happen). But these two scenarios are not quite alike, are they, considering in one case the person is doing something I believe is wrong, and in the other case something I believe is right, or at the very least acceptable. Getting together to force the dismissal of a person from a position of power based on their views is not automatically bad or good. It is bad or good depending on what the views are. Homophobic views are bad; it is good to get people dismissed from power based on those views. A woman's right to choose is good; getting people dismissed from power based on that view is bad.
- dkhenry 13y ago
  So what your saying is as long as the angry mob agrees with you then its ok, but if they disagree with you then they are wrong.
  - jamesaguilar 13y ago
    If by "angry mob" you mean "the broad moral view of society," yep, that is what I'm saying. If your morality disagrees with society's to a great enough degree, it is right, for the purposes of this discussion, that you be removed from power. (Caveat: as a moral descriptivist I should point out that I believe there is not really any such thing as "right" or "wrong," just what people like and don't like. But, as shorthand, I use the same words other people use.)
    - nebstrebor 13y ago
      Lets not forget that he supported "the broad moral view of society", as evidenced by a popular vote at the time. I'll agree that the "broad moral view" has switched, and turn about is fair play. Let us punish the new minority.
      - jamesaguilar 13y ago
        Ah, but he has a choice to be in that minority. He could work on his empathy, examine his beliefs, and come to the correct conclusion (that two people having equal protection for their sexual preferences will hurt him in no way). All he needed to do to avoid this situation was right wrong beliefs, and publicly acknowledge the same, the same way he previously publicly embraced those beliefs. Those in whose oppression he assisted have no such option, as you cannot, at least according to current science, examine your sexual preferences and change them.
        mpyne 13y ago
        > He could work on his empathy, examine his beliefs, and come to the correct conclusion Yeah, if he keeps looking and examining what's wrong with him he will eventually see that there really are five lights. I mean, that's all it takes right? We simply choose what to believe as it's convenient to us?
        jamesaguilar 13y ago
- thropix 13y ago
  You say that the two situations are not alike, because you believe is wrong, and the other is right. ... So I suppose we should all judge everyone's actions based on what you believe? Since, obviously everyone has their opinions, but those who have opinions other than yours are wrong.
  - jamesaguilar 13y ago
    That is not a fair or reasonable way to interpret what I said. The personal pronouns I used are obvious stand-ins for large swathes of society whose view agree with mine.
    - thropix 13y ago
      Ah, right. So we should just go with what most people believe. Mob rule. Of course. You might find it surprising that a number of people on the other side of this issue would agree with you. They know they're right, so everyone should just agree with them. That's not exactly a scalable approach to social issues.
- randallsquared 13y ago
  "But these two scenarios are not quite alike, are they, considering in one case the person is doing something I believe is wrong [...]" Double standards for tactics is the subject of this rather long article by someone more articulate about it than I am: http://slatestarcodex.com/2014/02/23/in-favor-of-niceness-community-and-civilization/ http://slatestarcodex.com/2014/02/23/in-favor-of-niceness-co...
- gklitt 13y ago
  This opinion is deeply disconcerting to me. I think our society needs to be very cautious in drawing the line between "acceptable" and "unacceptable" views. Plenty of people have views I disagree with, but which I still consider within the realm of "acceptability". If people don't have a right to reasonable private opinions, the political majority can wave around stories like this one as an incentive to prevent minorities from speaking up. If Eich had actively spoken out hatefully against gay people, I would agree that his resignation would be warranted. But he has done nothing of the sort, and committed in a blog post to equality at Mozilla. I think Mozilla's actions smell like a hasty overreaction which sets a dangerous precedent.
  - jamesaguilar 13y ago
    > If people don't have a right to reasonable private opinions I question the assumption that this opinion: "gay people ought not be allowed to marry" is a reasonable one. I'll accept common, but I don't agree that it's reasonable. Also, he does still have the right to that opinion. He just doesn't have the right to express it free of consequences. Also, he didn't hold that opinion privately. He held it publicly (by donating money to support its enforcement via the law).
  - matthewmacleod 13y ago
    If people don't have a right to reasonable private opinions Define reasonable. The fact that you can't demonstrates why this argument is baseless. "Reasonableness" is decided by social desires, ultimately, and that's exactly what happened in this case.
- cousin_it 13y ago
  Thanks you for writing that comment! I'm mostly on the side that disagrees with you, but you've expressed your position beautifully and I can only wish that everyone expressed their positions in the same way. In particular, this seems to be the central point of the whole discussion: > Getting together to force the dismissal of a person from a position of power based on their views is not automatically bad or good. It is bad or good depending on what the views are. It's just so delightfully free from rationalization! Where other left-leaning folks pretend to use some abstract rules that apply to both sides equally, and make up bogus "fundamental differences" between positions that outrage the left and positions that outrage the right, you say outright that you're going to use your moral judgment on a case-by-case basis. That might be right or wrong, but at least we can have a sensible discussion about it. So, even though I believe that forcing Eich to step down was wrong, I urge everyone to upvote the parent :-)
  - jamesaguilar 13y ago
    The whole category of moral non-cognitivist beliefs is a really freeing way to look at the world. A lot of things make sense that just don't under other frameworks. I'm a true novice in this area, but that's how I see it.
    - cousin_it 13y ago
      Yeah, I agree it feels liberating. Though I prefer the broader label of "non-realist", because "non-cognitivist" seems too restrictive. For example, if you think mankind might someday create an AI that would satisfy the preferences of humans, then you need these preferences to be expressible mathematically, as some kind of utility function. If you're a non-realist, you're okay with that, as long as the utility function is specific to humans (i.e. the utility functions of human-built AI and alien-built AI don't have to be the same). But if you're also a non-cognitivist, then you're in a difficult spot, because obviously one can make true and false statements about a mathematical function. Does that make sense? (Disclaimer - I'm a Google engineer as well, and also pretty active on lesswrong.com which has covered these issues in much detail.)
      - 13y ago
benched 13y ago
"Sure, you could say it's a human rights issue." Are you sure you don't want to give this possibility a little more weight? Maybe a lot more weight? I mean, what if it is a human rights issue? Of course not, that would be silly. It would not be "silly" for Christians to target people for being pro-choice. That would be right in line with being Christian.
- deleted 13y ago
  [deleted]
  - benched 13y ago
    Oh for fucks sake. Whether or not every Christian is pro-life doesn't change what I said, but thanks for the tangent. Every Internet argument can use more pedantic tangents!
    - daeken 13y ago
      The comment you responded to was out of line, but that doesn't mean you should respond in kind. Let's keep the discourse civil.
      - benched 13y ago
        I'm sure I wrote what I did on purpose. Thanks for the invite, though!
jrs235 13y ago
The issue isn't about rights. I wish everyone would recognize it's about privileges and equal treatment. The benefits [of a government recognized marriage] (tax breaks, visitations, spousal benefits, etc.) are all privileges. How can you tell? Because with the stroke of a pen all those things could be revoked by the government.
- aganders3 13y ago
  Sure, but equal access to those privileges is a civil right.
  - jrs235 13y ago
    Everyone has equal access. Every person is allowed to marry one other person of a different sex. I get it. People don't like the "of a different sex" in there and they have the right to appeal to have that removed. I'm more in favor with getting rid of marriage privileges all together... why burden single people? UPDATE: To the downvoter, am I wrong or do you just disagree? Please clarify by commenting.
    - dragonwriter 13y ago
      > Everyone has equal access. Every person is allowed to marry one other person of a different sex. Which discriminates by sex the same way that "every person is allowed to marry one person of the same race" discriminates by race. > I'm more in favor with getting rid of marriage privileges all together... why burden single people? How does the option to marry burden people who choose not to exercise that option?
      - jrs235 13y ago
        Thank you for commenting. I still say access is equal. It doesn't discriminate based on sex, it discriminates based on preference. It seems there are two camps that disagrees whether its acceptable or not to discriminate by that. (Update: your point about race is great and forcing me to rethink my stance by the way.) What is the purpose of marriage benefits? How does having them benefit society enough that government wishes to recognize it? I'd guess its to encourage offspring in order to continue future prosperity. I'm proposing we step back and ask, what's the purpose of recognizing marriages? What are we trying to incentivize and is it working? Rather than blindly extending things perhaps we should consider repealing or scaling them back? Look at the war on drugs, we thought banning marijuana would be beneficial, we're now questioning that. The second point of burden pertains mostly to giving tax breaks to married couples.
zorpner 13y ago
> an intollerant lynch mob People have a right to not be murdered. They do not have a right to be the CEO of a company. A group of people can say whatever they like, and if it puts sufficient pressure on a company that company can choose whether to act. What specific part of what happened here would you like to ban?
- peterwoo 13y ago
  He didn't say or even insinuate that one has a right to be CEO of anything nor that any kind of speech should be banned.
  - zorpner 13y ago
    A "lynch mob" is a pejorative term because it refers to a group of people who deprive another person of both their right to a fair trial, and subsequently their right to not be murdered (it also carries connotations of innocence, and a mob looking for a victim that fits a particular preconceived profile). Banning speech is reductio ad absurdum of arguments that what happened to Eich should be somehow prevented. Because that's all that happened -- people making choices about what products to use, and talking to other people about that choice.
    - peterwoo 13y ago
      Well neither did he say or imply that it should be prevented, so again you're being fallacious here.
stormbrew 13y ago
> But ask yourself, would you consider it reasonable for Christians to target some arbitrary CEO who donated some money to planned parenthood several years ago You do realize this kind of thing actually happens, right? The right wing of american politics is an avid user of and believer in boycotts. Personally, I have no issue with this. No company is entitled to a person's money, and if they make their public face about politics they accept the consequences, both good and bad, of doing that. And it really is worth noting that there are often positive consequences of doing it as well. Even for causes I disagree with. Chick-Fil-A probably came out a bit ahead, if anything, since their presence was stronger in markets that supported them. Likewise, Disney openly supporting gay rights through Gay Days at Disneyland and making sure their insurance supports gay employees' families have had both positive and negative impacts. This faux-freedom argument, where people aren't entitled to decide how their own money is spent but the richest and most powerful are entitled to do whatever they want with theirs without any fear of consequence is just a ridiculous double standard.
- jiojk542 13y ago
  "The right wing of american politics is an avid user of and believer in boycotts." Which companies have they boycotted? The recent organized calls for boycotts include Chick-Fil-A, Mozilla, Walmart, McDonald's, etc. I haven't seen the right calling for a boycott of companies that supported gay marriage initiatives. Seems like the left is more into boycotts than the right.
  - jaibot 13y ago
    There is an ongoing conservative boycott of the Girl Scouts of America: http://cookiecott.com/ http://cookiecott.com/
    - tgdfhgfh 13y ago
      and in response... http://monsantoboycott.com/ http://monsantoboycott.com/
  - stormbrew 13y ago
deleted 13y ago
[deleted]
otikik 13y ago
> But ask yourself, would you consider it reasonable for Christians to target some arbitrary CEO who donated some money to planned parenthood several years ago Well, the US still can't have an an openly atheist president. So, yeah, I can imagine.
jusben1369 13y ago
It's a little like this being 1969 and Eich, having grown up in the Deep South, admits giving donations to a Proposition to stop interracial marriage. You could rationalize it by saying it's happening at a time of very rapidly changing social views on what's normal and that he's from the South and that he's not against blacks per se. He just doesn't think it's a good idea they breed with whites. But it's still wrong. I have no sympathy for Eich as he's a fully grown adult who works in one of the more open minded industries in one of the most liberal parts of the US and he actively wants to lead people. A great leader has to be tolerant of a wide range of social and cultural POV. He demonstrated he's not very tolerant. Bad sign.
- jiojk542 13y ago
  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/False_balance http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/False_balance Sexual orientation does not equal race. Scientists have never isolated a gay gene. There are no definitive causes of homosexuality. His opinion of homosexuality as a choice is as scientifically valid as your belief that it's innate. Why is he wrong and you right?
  - ottonomy 13y ago
    Worried enough about posting this that you'd create a new account so that people don't see this connected to whatever your long-term identity is?
    - tgdfhgfh 13y ago
      Don't you see? If anyone decides to say an unpopular opinion that offends the left, their lives and careers would probably be ruined. Doesn't that stifle conversation? How is that a good thing?
  - bemaniac 13y ago
    If sexual orientation is a choice, then why aren't there throngs of "straight" male scientists choosing to be gay for a while, fucking a bunch of dudes, enjoying it (that's the key part), then writing papers on it?
baconner 13y ago
Yes its unfortunate that Mozilla is going to miss out on Eich's contributions. But ultimately the result here shows that the benefits however great they may have been didn't outweigh the costs of his beleifs alienating the community Mozilla is built upon. Its not intolerant to not want to work under the leadership of someone who has worked to do you and others you care about active harm.
- waps 13y ago
  Can you clarify something for me : are you a democrat or a republican ? And which of those 2 groups should be fired from their jobs ? Any religions that perhaps should see all their members fired ? Which ones ? Do tell.
  - baconner 13y ago
    I never advocated firing anyone actually including eich, but right or wrong employers certainly have the right to fire someone for their outside of work activities if its interfering with their ability to do their job. There are only very narrow protections for protected classes here. Everyone has the right to free speech in this country which is great, but free speech does not come with any assurance that there will not be consequences. You have no right to be free from criticism. You have no right to expect your employer to keep you on if you're damaging their business by generating bad press. I think this fundamental misunderstanding of free speech often drives these sort of "its intolerant of you to not tolerate my intolerant speech" sort of comments. Free speech comes with a great responsibility - accept the consequences of your speech.
jasonlotito 13y ago
> would you consider it reasonable... For people to speak with their wallet? Yeah. For people to speak up if they disagree? Yes. For people to speak up if they agree? Sure. I'm for freedom of speech. Thinking that people can't speak up would go against that belief. Now, granted, if I speak up, I need to be accountable for what I say. Freedom of speech is guaranteed by the government. It doesn't mean you get to silence your critics. > Of course not, that would be silly. Why do you think people using their freedom to speak silly? I'm also curious if you held the same beliefs when the CEO of GoDaddy killed an elephant, and there was the public outcry over that.
3am 13y ago
"would you consider it reasonable for Christians to target some arbitrary CEO who donated some money to planned parenthood several years ago" Do you mean exactly how they (Family Research Council in these cases) did with the Girl Scouts, Coca Cola, or Starbucks? I mean, that's just off the top of my head.
vesinisa 13y ago
You compare the situation with a group targeting an 'arbitrary CEO' for making a donation several years back for planned parenthood. I would actually understand this, if the arbitrary CEO was leading a company associated with a pro-life church, with most members having anti-abortion stance. Although the CEO is certainly entitled to his views, I would not think he would be fit to lead a company if those publicly known views are actually in strong disagreement with the pro-life church's following. Now, replace planned parenthood with "Prop 8", pro-life church with "inclusive open source community" and anti-abortion with "pro LGBT-rights".
thaumaturgy 13y ago
Would you support a business led by, say, a known member of the KKK? I'm not asking to be inflammatory, nor am I comparing Eich's views to that. I've seen a number of statements like yours as the main counterargument to the criticism of Eich as CEO, and I'm genuinely curious whether the argument is, "anything goes, and personal values have no place in business", or, "I don't think gay marriage is an important enough issue to warrant this level of criticism", or something else.
- jiojk542 13y ago
  And yet, his views are totally liberal relative to the views you find in some Muslim countries, where homosexuals are sentenced to death or are just killed outright. Why aren't you focused on that, instead of worrying about the definition of marriage for the time being? Aren't there much larger fish to fry?
  - Einstalbert 13y ago
    I do sort of feel as though this was a "fish in the barrel" target that people are feeling good about. Yes, everything small matters in large numbers, but I don't think this is really much to show in terms of LGBT rights progress. It has the veneer of the armchair activism you see on Tumblr.
matthewmacleod 13y ago
Instead he got targetted by an intollerant lynch mob that felt it had to strong-arm someone with views they didn't agree with Stop being so dramatic; this was not a lynch mob, it was a bunch of rightly pissed-off people, including many members of the open web community, who were angered that somebody who had been actively trying to strip their civil rights had been promoted to the head of an organisation which explicitly talks about the importance of diversity in the community. It is really super difficult to reasonably say that objecting to someone's intolerance is in itself intolerance.
- tgdfhgfh 13y ago
  But conservatives who support traditional marriage (and civil unions with the same rights as marriage) are not welcome in the club, right? How is that appreciating a diversity of thought?
  - bemaniac 13y ago
    They're not welcome to the club when they're taking actions to strip the rights of another individual. Opinions are one thing, concrete actions are another.
    - mcphage 13y ago
      > Opinions are one thing, concrete actions are another. Where's the line? Donating $100,000? Donating $1,000? Donating $5? Voting? Discussing your opinion? Setting your facebook profile? Telling someone when they ask? Not answering when they ask?
      - gress 13y ago
        The donation wasn't for a public information campaign to encourage gay people not to marry. If was for a law to force them not to. That's the difference.
  - matthewmacleod 13y ago
    You know, if Erich had stated "Hey, I'm not pro gay-marriage, but I'm really behind equal civil partnerships that offer all the same rights" then the backlash would be much milder. But there is a vanishingly small number of people who hold that opinion, because it's pretty ludicrous (boils down to 'this word is so important that it must not be changed, despite the fact that I don't object at all to equality')
uvTwitch 13y ago
No, it's not unfortunate at all, you idiot. Anyone who harbours hateful beliefs is not A Nice Person, nor should they be anywhere near a position of leadership. Since you obviously need assistance with your flawed thinking, you can start by recognising that your argument would hold identical merit and positioning were he a member of the Ku Klux Klan.
bowlofpetunias 13y ago
Religious fundamentalists target the rest of us all the time. That is the problem here, not the other way around. It's exactly this hateful, viciously intolerant attitude Eich represents ("someone nice"? seriously?). There's nothing silly about not wanting anything to do with people like that, or the organisations they represent. And that's all people have done: stated, in various ways, they wanted nothing to do with Eich. Which doesn't even come close to Eich's agenda of denying people equal rights simply because of how they were born. I find it beyond comprehension that someone like Eich is being portrayed as the victim here, or that we should simply accept having active bigots as leaders, CEO's, employers or business partners. The protesters aren't the lynch mob. Eich and his kind are.
pvg 13y ago
You and many like you keep saying he lost his job over 'unpopular views others didn't agree with'. The sort of thing, as Brendan Eich says, you can leave at the door when you come to work. But it isn't as if Brendan Eich lost his job because he went out for beers with a few co-workers and, in an unguarded moment' said something like 'you know what, that that whole marriage between people of the same gender just doesn't square with my religious faith'. I wonder if people like you are familiar with what California Proposition 8 was. California courts had already ruled that same-sex marriages were valid under the California constitution and such marriages were already taking place. Prop 8, funded in part by out-of-state conservative religious groups, sought to modify the constitution to define marriage as solely between a man and a woman. That is what Brendan Eich was for and that's what he supported with his money - the legal imposition of a specific belief on a historically discriminated-against minority. It's certainly his right to do so but it's hardly compatible with holding the top leadership and representative position at Mozilla. If you were the leader of a Catholic charity but expressed strong pro-choice views, you'd probably have trouble holding onto your position as well. As a meta point, speaking of discriminated minorities, you should probably avoid calling people who, however vocally, express views different than yours on the internet a 'lynch mob'.
- tzs 13y ago
  > California courts had already ruled that same-sex marriages were valid under the California constitution [...] Actually, it was the other way around. They had ruled that prohibiting same-sex marriage was invalid under the California constitution.
  - pvg 13y ago
    Yep, you're right, I lazied out on looking it up before typing. Inexplicably, someone downvoted you, to boot.
lostsock 13y ago
Will the people who tried to boycott Mozilla over Brendan Eich's appointment also refuse to use any of his creations? If OkCupid said that they were planning to stop using Javascript because of his views I would have respected them a lot more than simply vilifying someone for their private personal donations to causes they believe in.
- mirkules 13y ago
  To summarize the real issue here: if we stopped using a company's products just because we disagree with the personal views of its founders, leaders or employees, we wouldn't use any products at all. This event worries me because it makes freedom of speech effectively irrelevant.
daniel-cussen 13y ago
> lynch mob I like to think of them as "firing squads", because they aim to get people fired.

by pvnick 13y ago

zobzu 13y ago

yeah he had great views such as making firefox technically relevant (through rust, through asmjs, through multiprocessing, etc) and looking at mozilla's real value (users trust mozilla) except, that 2nd point became an issue with him ceo, too. sad.

jamesaguilar 13y ago

Um. Yes, I would be upset if your proposed scenario happened (and similar things do happen). But these two scenarios are not quite alike, are they, considering in one case the person is doing something I believe is wrong, and in the other case something I believe is right, or at the very least acceptable. Getting together to force the dismissal of a person from a position of power based on their views is not automatically bad or good. It is bad or good depending on what the views are. Homophobic views are bad; it is good to get people dismissed from power based on those views. A woman's right to choose is good; getting people dismissed from power based on that view is bad.

dkhenry 13y ago
So what your saying is as long as the angry mob agrees with you then its ok, but if they disagree with you then they are wrong.
- jamesaguilar 13y ago
  If by "angry mob" you mean "the broad moral view of society," yep, that is what I'm saying. If your morality disagrees with society's to a great enough degree, it is right, for the purposes of this discussion, that you be removed from power. (Caveat: as a moral descriptivist I should point out that I believe there is not really any such thing as "right" or "wrong," just what people like and don't like. But, as shorthand, I use the same words other people use.)
  - nebstrebor 13y ago
    Lets not forget that he supported "the broad moral view of society", as evidenced by a popular vote at the time. I'll agree that the "broad moral view" has switched, and turn about is fair play. Let us punish the new minority.
    - jamesaguilar 13y ago
      Ah, but he has a choice to be in that minority. He could work on his empathy, examine his beliefs, and come to the correct conclusion (that two people having equal protection for their sexual preferences will hurt him in no way). All he needed to do to avoid this situation was right wrong beliefs, and publicly acknowledge the same, the same way he previously publicly embraced those beliefs. Those in whose oppression he assisted have no such option, as you cannot, at least according to current science, examine your sexual preferences and change them.
      - mpyne 13y ago
        > He could work on his empathy, examine his beliefs, and come to the correct conclusion Yeah, if he keeps looking and examining what's wrong with him he will eventually see that there really are five lights. I mean, that's all it takes right? We simply choose what to believe as it's convenient to us?
        jamesaguilar 13y ago
thropix 13y ago
You say that the two situations are not alike, because you believe is wrong, and the other is right. ... So I suppose we should all judge everyone's actions based on what you believe? Since, obviously everyone has their opinions, but those who have opinions other than yours are wrong.
- jamesaguilar 13y ago
  That is not a fair or reasonable way to interpret what I said. The personal pronouns I used are obvious stand-ins for large swathes of society whose view agree with mine.
  - thropix 13y ago
    Ah, right. So we should just go with what most people believe. Mob rule. Of course. You might find it surprising that a number of people on the other side of this issue would agree with you. They know they're right, so everyone should just agree with them. That's not exactly a scalable approach to social issues.
randallsquared 13y ago
"But these two scenarios are not quite alike, are they, considering in one case the person is doing something I believe is wrong [...]" Double standards for tactics is the subject of this rather long article by someone more articulate about it than I am: http://slatestarcodex.com/2014/02/23/in-favor-of-niceness-community-and-civilization/ http://slatestarcodex.com/2014/02/23/in-favor-of-niceness-co...
gklitt 13y ago
This opinion is deeply disconcerting to me. I think our society needs to be very cautious in drawing the line between "acceptable" and "unacceptable" views. Plenty of people have views I disagree with, but which I still consider within the realm of "acceptability". If people don't have a right to reasonable private opinions, the political majority can wave around stories like this one as an incentive to prevent minorities from speaking up. If Eich had actively spoken out hatefully against gay people, I would agree that his resignation would be warranted. But he has done nothing of the sort, and committed in a blog post to equality at Mozilla. I think Mozilla's actions smell like a hasty overreaction which sets a dangerous precedent.
- jamesaguilar 13y ago
  > If people don't have a right to reasonable private opinions I question the assumption that this opinion: "gay people ought not be allowed to marry" is a reasonable one. I'll accept common, but I don't agree that it's reasonable. Also, he does still have the right to that opinion. He just doesn't have the right to express it free of consequences. Also, he didn't hold that opinion privately. He held it publicly (by donating money to support its enforcement via the law).
- matthewmacleod 13y ago
  If people don't have a right to reasonable private opinions Define reasonable. The fact that you can't demonstrates why this argument is baseless. "Reasonableness" is decided by social desires, ultimately, and that's exactly what happened in this case.
cousin_it 13y ago
Thanks you for writing that comment! I'm mostly on the side that disagrees with you, but you've expressed your position beautifully and I can only wish that everyone expressed their positions in the same way. In particular, this seems to be the central point of the whole discussion: > Getting together to force the dismissal of a person from a position of power based on their views is not automatically bad or good. It is bad or good depending on what the views are. It's just so delightfully free from rationalization! Where other left-leaning folks pretend to use some abstract rules that apply to both sides equally, and make up bogus "fundamental differences" between positions that outrage the left and positions that outrage the right, you say outright that you're going to use your moral judgment on a case-by-case basis. That might be right or wrong, but at least we can have a sensible discussion about it. So, even though I believe that forcing Eich to step down was wrong, I urge everyone to upvote the parent :-)
- jamesaguilar 13y ago
  The whole category of moral non-cognitivist beliefs is a really freeing way to look at the world. A lot of things make sense that just don't under other frameworks. I'm a true novice in this area, but that's how I see it.
  - cousin_it 13y ago
    Yeah, I agree it feels liberating. Though I prefer the broader label of "non-realist", because "non-cognitivist" seems too restrictive. For example, if you think mankind might someday create an AI that would satisfy the preferences of humans, then you need these preferences to be expressible mathematically, as some kind of utility function. If you're a non-realist, you're okay with that, as long as the utility function is specific to humans (i.e. the utility functions of human-built AI and alien-built AI don't have to be the same). But if you're also a non-cognitivist, then you're in a difficult spot, because obviously one can make true and false statements about a mathematical function. Does that make sense? (Disclaimer - I'm a Google engineer as well, and also pretty active on lesswrong.com which has covered these issues in much detail.)
    - 13y ago

benched 13y ago

"Sure, you could say it's a human rights issue." Are you sure you don't want to give this possibility a little more weight? Maybe a lot more weight? I mean, what if it is a human rights issue? Of course not, that would be silly. It would not be "silly" for Christians to target people for being pro-choice. That would be right in line with being Christian.

deleted 13y ago
[deleted]
- benched 13y ago
  Oh for fucks sake. Whether or not every Christian is pro-life doesn't change what I said, but thanks for the tangent. Every Internet argument can use more pedantic tangents!
  - daeken 13y ago
    The comment you responded to was out of line, but that doesn't mean you should respond in kind. Let's keep the discourse civil.
    - benched 13y ago
      I'm sure I wrote what I did on purpose. Thanks for the invite, though!

jrs235 13y ago

The issue isn't about rights. I wish everyone would recognize it's about privileges and equal treatment. The benefits [of a government recognized marriage] (tax breaks, visitations, spousal benefits, etc.) are all privileges. How can you tell? Because with the stroke of a pen all those things could be revoked by the government.

aganders3 13y ago
Sure, but equal access to those privileges is a civil right.
- jrs235 13y ago
  Everyone has equal access. Every person is allowed to marry one other person of a different sex. I get it. People don't like the "of a different sex" in there and they have the right to appeal to have that removed. I'm more in favor with getting rid of marriage privileges all together... why burden single people? UPDATE: To the downvoter, am I wrong or do you just disagree? Please clarify by commenting.
  - dragonwriter 13y ago
    > Everyone has equal access. Every person is allowed to marry one other person of a different sex. Which discriminates by sex the same way that "every person is allowed to marry one person of the same race" discriminates by race. > I'm more in favor with getting rid of marriage privileges all together... why burden single people? How does the option to marry burden people who choose not to exercise that option?
    - jrs235 13y ago
      Thank you for commenting. I still say access is equal. It doesn't discriminate based on sex, it discriminates based on preference. It seems there are two camps that disagrees whether its acceptable or not to discriminate by that. (Update: your point about race is great and forcing me to rethink my stance by the way.) What is the purpose of marriage benefits? How does having them benefit society enough that government wishes to recognize it? I'd guess its to encourage offspring in order to continue future prosperity. I'm proposing we step back and ask, what's the purpose of recognizing marriages? What are we trying to incentivize and is it working? Rather than blindly extending things perhaps we should consider repealing or scaling them back? Look at the war on drugs, we thought banning marijuana would be beneficial, we're now questioning that. The second point of burden pertains mostly to giving tax breaks to married couples.

zorpner 13y ago

> an intollerant lynch mob People have a right to not be murdered. They do not have a right to be the CEO of a company. A group of people can say whatever they like, and if it puts sufficient pressure on a company that company can choose whether to act. What specific part of what happened here would you like to ban?

peterwoo 13y ago
He didn't say or even insinuate that one has a right to be CEO of anything nor that any kind of speech should be banned.
- zorpner 13y ago
  A "lynch mob" is a pejorative term because it refers to a group of people who deprive another person of both their right to a fair trial, and subsequently their right to not be murdered (it also carries connotations of innocence, and a mob looking for a victim that fits a particular preconceived profile). Banning speech is reductio ad absurdum of arguments that what happened to Eich should be somehow prevented. Because that's all that happened -- people making choices about what products to use, and talking to other people about that choice.
  - peterwoo 13y ago
    Well neither did he say or imply that it should be prevented, so again you're being fallacious here.

stormbrew 13y ago

> But ask yourself, would you consider it reasonable for Christians to target some arbitrary CEO who donated some money to planned parenthood several years ago You do realize this kind of thing actually happens, right? The right wing of american politics is an avid user of and believer in boycotts. Personally, I have no issue with this. No company is entitled to a person's money, and if they make their public face about politics they accept the consequences, both good and bad, of doing that. And it really is worth noting that there are often positive consequences of doing it as well. Even for causes I disagree with. Chick-Fil-A probably came out a bit ahead, if anything, since their presence was stronger in markets that supported them. Likewise, Disney openly supporting gay rights through Gay Days at Disneyland and making sure their insurance supports gay employees' families have had both positive and negative impacts. This faux-freedom argument, where people aren't entitled to decide how their own money is spent but the richest and most powerful are entitled to do whatever they want with theirs without any fear of consequence is just a ridiculous double standard.

jiojk542 13y ago
"The right wing of american politics is an avid user of and believer in boycotts." Which companies have they boycotted? The recent organized calls for boycotts include Chick-Fil-A, Mozilla, Walmart, McDonald's, etc. I haven't seen the right calling for a boycott of companies that supported gay marriage initiatives. Seems like the left is more into boycotts than the right.
- jaibot 13y ago
  There is an ongoing conservative boycott of the Girl Scouts of America: http://cookiecott.com/ http://cookiecott.com/
  - tgdfhgfh 13y ago
    and in response... http://monsantoboycott.com/ http://monsantoboycott.com/
- stormbrew 13y ago

deleted 13y ago

[deleted]

otikik 13y ago

> But ask yourself, would you consider it reasonable for Christians to target some arbitrary CEO who donated some money to planned parenthood several years ago Well, the US still can't have an an openly atheist president. So, yeah, I can imagine.

jusben1369 13y ago

It's a little like this being 1969 and Eich, having grown up in the Deep South, admits giving donations to a Proposition to stop interracial marriage. You could rationalize it by saying it's happening at a time of very rapidly changing social views on what's normal and that he's from the South and that he's not against blacks per se. He just doesn't think it's a good idea they breed with whites. But it's still wrong. I have no sympathy for Eich as he's a fully grown adult who works in one of the more open minded industries in one of the most liberal parts of the US and he actively wants to lead people. A great leader has to be tolerant of a wide range of social and cultural POV. He demonstrated he's not very tolerant. Bad sign.

jiojk542 13y ago
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/False_balance http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/False_balance Sexual orientation does not equal race. Scientists have never isolated a gay gene. There are no definitive causes of homosexuality. His opinion of homosexuality as a choice is as scientifically valid as your belief that it's innate. Why is he wrong and you right?
- ottonomy 13y ago
  Worried enough about posting this that you'd create a new account so that people don't see this connected to whatever your long-term identity is?
  - tgdfhgfh 13y ago
    Don't you see? If anyone decides to say an unpopular opinion that offends the left, their lives and careers would probably be ruined. Doesn't that stifle conversation? How is that a good thing?
- bemaniac 13y ago
  If sexual orientation is a choice, then why aren't there throngs of "straight" male scientists choosing to be gay for a while, fucking a bunch of dudes, enjoying it (that's the key part), then writing papers on it?

baconner 13y ago

Yes its unfortunate that Mozilla is going to miss out on Eich's contributions. But ultimately the result here shows that the benefits however great they may have been didn't outweigh the costs of his beleifs alienating the community Mozilla is built upon. Its not intolerant to not want to work under the leadership of someone who has worked to do you and others you care about active harm.

waps 13y ago
Can you clarify something for me : are you a democrat or a republican ? And which of those 2 groups should be fired from their jobs ? Any religions that perhaps should see all their members fired ? Which ones ? Do tell.
- baconner 13y ago
  I never advocated firing anyone actually including eich, but right or wrong employers certainly have the right to fire someone for their outside of work activities if its interfering with their ability to do their job. There are only very narrow protections for protected classes here. Everyone has the right to free speech in this country which is great, but free speech does not come with any assurance that there will not be consequences. You have no right to be free from criticism. You have no right to expect your employer to keep you on if you're damaging their business by generating bad press. I think this fundamental misunderstanding of free speech often drives these sort of "its intolerant of you to not tolerate my intolerant speech" sort of comments. Free speech comes with a great responsibility - accept the consequences of your speech.

jasonlotito 13y ago

> would you consider it reasonable... For people to speak with their wallet? Yeah. For people to speak up if they disagree? Yes. For people to speak up if they agree? Sure. I'm for freedom of speech. Thinking that people can't speak up would go against that belief. Now, granted, if I speak up, I need to be accountable for what I say. Freedom of speech is guaranteed by the government. It doesn't mean you get to silence your critics. > Of course not, that would be silly. Why do you think people using their freedom to speak silly? I'm also curious if you held the same beliefs when the CEO of GoDaddy killed an elephant, and there was the public outcry over that.

3am 13y ago

"would you consider it reasonable for Christians to target some arbitrary CEO who donated some money to planned parenthood several years ago" Do you mean exactly how they (Family Research Council in these cases) did with the Girl Scouts, Coca Cola, or Starbucks? I mean, that's just off the top of my head.

vesinisa 13y ago

You compare the situation with a group targeting an 'arbitrary CEO' for making a donation several years back for planned parenthood. I would actually understand this, if the arbitrary CEO was leading a company associated with a pro-life church, with most members having anti-abortion stance. Although the CEO is certainly entitled to his views, I would not think he would be fit to lead a company if those publicly known views are actually in strong disagreement with the pro-life church's following. Now, replace planned parenthood with "Prop 8", pro-life church with "inclusive open source community" and anti-abortion with "pro LGBT-rights".

thaumaturgy 13y ago

Would you support a business led by, say, a known member of the KKK? I'm not asking to be inflammatory, nor am I comparing Eich's views to that. I've seen a number of statements like yours as the main counterargument to the criticism of Eich as CEO, and I'm genuinely curious whether the argument is, "anything goes, and personal values have no place in business", or, "I don't think gay marriage is an important enough issue to warrant this level of criticism", or something else.

jiojk542 13y ago
And yet, his views are totally liberal relative to the views you find in some Muslim countries, where homosexuals are sentenced to death or are just killed outright. Why aren't you focused on that, instead of worrying about the definition of marriage for the time being? Aren't there much larger fish to fry?
- Einstalbert 13y ago
  I do sort of feel as though this was a "fish in the barrel" target that people are feeling good about. Yes, everything small matters in large numbers, but I don't think this is really much to show in terms of LGBT rights progress. It has the veneer of the armchair activism you see on Tumblr.

matthewmacleod 13y ago

Instead he got targetted by an intollerant lynch mob that felt it had to strong-arm someone with views they didn't agree with Stop being so dramatic; this was not a lynch mob, it was a bunch of rightly pissed-off people, including many members of the open web community, who were angered that somebody who had been actively trying to strip their civil rights had been promoted to the head of an organisation which explicitly talks about the importance of diversity in the community. It is really super difficult to reasonably say that objecting to someone's intolerance is in itself intolerance.

tgdfhgfh 13y ago
But conservatives who support traditional marriage (and civil unions with the same rights as marriage) are not welcome in the club, right? How is that appreciating a diversity of thought?
- bemaniac 13y ago
  They're not welcome to the club when they're taking actions to strip the rights of another individual. Opinions are one thing, concrete actions are another.
  - mcphage 13y ago
    > Opinions are one thing, concrete actions are another. Where's the line? Donating $100,000? Donating $1,000? Donating $5? Voting? Discussing your opinion? Setting your facebook profile? Telling someone when they ask? Not answering when they ask?
    - gress 13y ago
      The donation wasn't for a public information campaign to encourage gay people not to marry. If was for a law to force them not to. That's the difference.
- matthewmacleod 13y ago
  You know, if Erich had stated "Hey, I'm not pro gay-marriage, but I'm really behind equal civil partnerships that offer all the same rights" then the backlash would be much milder. But there is a vanishingly small number of people who hold that opinion, because it's pretty ludicrous (boils down to 'this word is so important that it must not be changed, despite the fact that I don't object at all to equality')

uvTwitch 13y ago

No, it's not unfortunate at all, you idiot. Anyone who harbours hateful beliefs is not A Nice Person, nor should they be anywhere near a position of leadership. Since you obviously need assistance with your flawed thinking, you can start by recognising that your argument would hold identical merit and positioning were he a member of the Ku Klux Klan.

bowlofpetunias 13y ago

Religious fundamentalists target the rest of us all the time. That is the problem here, not the other way around. It's exactly this hateful, viciously intolerant attitude Eich represents ("someone nice"? seriously?). There's nothing silly about not wanting anything to do with people like that, or the organisations they represent. And that's all people have done: stated, in various ways, they wanted nothing to do with Eich. Which doesn't even come close to Eich's agenda of denying people equal rights simply because of how they were born. I find it beyond comprehension that someone like Eich is being portrayed as the victim here, or that we should simply accept having active bigots as leaders, CEO's, employers or business partners. The protesters aren't the lynch mob. Eich and his kind are.

pvg 13y ago

You and many like you keep saying he lost his job over 'unpopular views others didn't agree with'. The sort of thing, as Brendan Eich says, you can leave at the door when you come to work. But it isn't as if Brendan Eich lost his job because he went out for beers with a few co-workers and, in an unguarded moment' said something like 'you know what, that that whole marriage between people of the same gender just doesn't square with my religious faith'. I wonder if people like you are familiar with what California Proposition 8 was. California courts had already ruled that same-sex marriages were valid under the California constitution and such marriages were already taking place. Prop 8, funded in part by out-of-state conservative religious groups, sought to modify the constitution to define marriage as solely between a man and a woman. That is what Brendan Eich was for and that's what he supported with his money - the legal imposition of a specific belief on a historically discriminated-against minority. It's certainly his right to do so but it's hardly compatible with holding the top leadership and representative position at Mozilla. If you were the leader of a Catholic charity but expressed strong pro-choice views, you'd probably have trouble holding onto your position as well. As a meta point, speaking of discriminated minorities, you should probably avoid calling people who, however vocally, express views different than yours on the internet a 'lynch mob'.

tzs 13y ago
> California courts had already ruled that same-sex marriages were valid under the California constitution [...] Actually, it was the other way around. They had ruled that prohibiting same-sex marriage was invalid under the California constitution.
- pvg 13y ago
  Yep, you're right, I lazied out on looking it up before typing. Inexplicably, someone downvoted you, to boot.

lostsock 13y ago

Will the people who tried to boycott Mozilla over Brendan Eich's appointment also refuse to use any of his creations? If OkCupid said that they were planning to stop using Javascript because of his views I would have respected them a lot more than simply vilifying someone for their private personal donations to causes they believe in.

mirkules 13y ago
To summarize the real issue here: if we stopped using a company's products just because we disagree with the personal views of its founders, leaders or employees, we wouldn't use any products at all. This event worries me because it makes freedom of speech effectively irrelevant.

daniel-cussen 13y ago

> lynch mob I like to think of them as "firing squads", because they aim to get people fired.